Tag Archives | Events

The Morbid Anatomy Museum and Stephen Romano are excited to announce a curated exhibition opening July 18 in recognition of the museum’s first year anniversary.

This milestone will be celebrated with an all day “Festival of Arcane Knowledge” followed by a Devil’s masquerade party. The exhibition will be comprised of a blend of historical, “Outsider”, and Visionary art, as well as contemporary works, vintage books, vernacular photography, folk sculpture, spirit photography, and many surprises. As with previous exhibitions curated by Stephen Romano, the design and content of the exhibition will be in constant dynamic motion throughout the course of the exhibition, adding, taking away, reflecting the synergistic relationship the curator has with the collection.

The exhibition examines the place the visionary occupies as the “HYPNAGOGIA”, defined as the experience of the transitional state from wakefulness to sleep: the hypnagogic state of consciousness, when mental phenomena such as lucid dreaming, hallucinations, and sleep paralysis occur.… Read the rest

Having just returned to London from painting his largest architectural scale installation to date, the exterior of a massive 5 story, 10k square foot food bank in Lower Silesia – Poland, RSH announces the release his limited edition print DIGITAL ADDICTION via London’s Imitate Modern Gallery.“Digital Addiction” is a powerful abstract metaform built from composite layers of paintings/3D modelling/html5 panorama/and collage to create an extraordinary print of light and depth that thematically considers society’s 21st century addiction to digital imagery and its continual manipulation.

A 5 colour silk screened, 3 colour ways print in an edition of 33 each on 400 gsm heavy Bristol paper with metallic ink overlays in each of copper, gold, and silver editions. The print image is 24×24 inches on a 32×32 inch sized paper.

“At all levels, ultimately graffiti is an act of cultural insurgency. It is a rebellion; against the norm, against society at large, against corporations, against the city or “government.” Graffiti is the act of changing the visual environment in the public space.

Between October 21st 2014 – November 2nd 2014 Fulgur Esoterica will host I:MAGE 2014 Traveling with Unfamiliar Spirits, a two weeks long festival dedicated to the relationship between contemporary artists and spirit entities. The festival comprises of a group exhibition (artists include Mark Titchner, Agostino Arrivabene, Shannon Taggart and Jesse Bransford), a one day academic conference at the Warburg Institute, the publication of three volumes exploring art and the occult (cinema, visual and performance art are all covered from both an academic and a practitioner standpoint) and a series of events.

“The Morbid Anatomy Library is delighted to announce the acquisition of a new lot of materials related to Santa Muerte, which is, depending on whom you ask, a Mexican-based “cult” or “new religion” which worships death as a female saint.

“Santa Muerte,” which literally translates to “Holy Death” or “Saint Death,” is popular in Mexico and the United States with disenfranchised populations for whom conventional Catholicism has not provided a better or safer life. It is thought to have its roots in the rich syncretism of the beliefs of the native Latin Americans and the colonizing Spanish Catholics.

The artifacts donated to the library, many of which you see above, include sacred books and pamphlets, devotional statues, magical soaps and oils, charms, incense, and even “La Biblia de la Santa Muerte.” They were generously donated by Friends of Morbid Anatomy Tonya Hurley and Tracy Hurley Martin as found on their travels in Mexico.”

These items have joined the library’s other “curiosities, books, photographs, artworks, ephemera, and artifacts relating to medical museums, anatomical art, collectors and collecting, cabinets of curiosity, the history of medicine, death and society, natural history, arcane media, and curiosity and curiosities broadly considered,” and are now on display in their collection.… Read the rest

The repressive, racist, red-state culture of the Bible-Belt has been invaded by Burners! Apparently, it’s no longer just a west coast phenomenon. The Burner subculture, along with its unique form of totally participatory, commerce-free weekend camping festivals, can now be found even in the darkest corners of the former Confederacy. Within half a decade, events like Transformus, Alchemy, and Euphoria (held this past weekend near Dalton, GA) have brought the culture and philosophy of Burning Man to the part of the country where, arguably, it is most needed. And the people down here really seem to enjoy it!

Hell, I’m a thirty-year-old veteran Disinfonaut, and I still enjoyed it. At least when I was smart enough to get my tickets early … Two out of three of these festivals, all official Burning Man Regional events, each sold out within hours. My friends and I were so bummed out that we couldn’t go, that we decide to throw a couple of Burn events on our own. … Read the rest

The fifth annual EsoZone Portland event will be held this weekend at p:ear, Friday evening November 18th and Saturday November 19th (see the website for schedule and location information).

EsoZone is festival celebrating alternative culture and thought. It follows a hybrid unconference/conference model, meaning that in addition to pre-programmed content, participants can propose their own sessions to share their own ideas, projects and skills with the group.

This years presentations include:

Tom Henderson, author of the forthcoming book Punk Rock Mathematics, on illusory nature of self.

Eric Schiller of Beyond Growth on “digital hipsterism” and the rise of anti-intellectualism in social media.

Contestants and their fans will converge in Montreal on October 27, 2010 for the first ever laughter competition — Le Grand Championnat de Rire de Montreal. Comedy contests are common, however this will be the world’s first televised laughing contest. The contest was inspired by my documentary Laughology, currently distributed by The Disinformation Company, in which I demonstrate that people can laugh spontaneously by using various "active laughter" techniques.
Contestants across Quebec will compete in diabolical laughter competitions, contagious laughter face-offs, and competitive laughter duels to see who will be crowned the "Best Laugher in Quebec.” The show is a pilot for an eventual international laughter competition to demonstrate that laughter could itself be a competitive sport.
The Championnat is a based on the revolutionary concept that because laughter is contagious: laughing makes people laugh. It involves games designed to produce natural contagious laughter. The whole event is also being filmed for Rire Extreme, a documentary for CANAL D. I got the idea for my documentary Laughology after meeting Doug Collins, an American who is said to have the most contagious laugh in the world:
I believe that because of Quebec’s tradition of Joie de Vivre and Quebec may have laughers who are as good or better than Collins. This summer Laughter contests where held at major Quebec festivals, including le Festival du Grand Rire in Quebec, The Western Festival of St. Tite and le Festival de Poutine du Drummonville. The winners of those contests have been invited to the Championnat which takes place at in Montreal in a special ring.
We really found some extraordinary laughers. I’m afraid to imagine what happens when we get them all in the same room. I hope that the idea of a laughter competition is to spread the positive, healthy emotions of laughter. And I'm trying to prove that laughter could be a competitive sport.
Contestants are coming from around Quebec however, we have left one spot open for one last great laugher. Auditions will be held on Oct 27th at Salla Rossa at 5 p.m. Please email hey@laughology.info. to be put on the list.

EsoZone Portland is back for another year! Once it again, the event is an unconference — an event in which the schedule is set by the participants on the fly at the event. Anything can happen, but some of the possible subjects include:

The "Laughman" Doug Collins arrived in New York this morning in a way that the hosts of the popular morning show on WPIX 11 TV won't forget for some time. He had them laughing so hard they couldn't read the news, as you'll see in this clip (make sure to watch till the end).
The Laughman is in New York City for the Great Union Square Laugh-In, taking place at Manhattan's Union Square South at 4:00 PM EST, Saturday September 25, 2010. If he can do this to a few people in a sterile TV studio, one can only imagine what's going to happen to the hundreds of people planning to attend. For details of the event check out the Facebook Page.